


Help You

by Donteatacowman



Category: Over the Garden Wall (Cartoon)
Genre: Gen, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-19
Updated: 2017-10-19
Packaged: 2019-01-19 13:34:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12411270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Donteatacowman/pseuds/Donteatacowman
Summary: Opera was the background music of Wirt’s life.He wasn’t sure when the transition had happened. Sometime after he’d come back from the Unknown, of course, so it had to be after Halloween. But it had come on so gradually. Wirt hadn’t seen the changes until it was too late.





	Help You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nolifeisenough](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nolifeisenough/gifts).



> May or may not continue this, but it's a crossover with the musical Be More Chill. Well, one of those "characters in _ role" crossovers, but I don't like it when those are written as scene-by-scene copies of the originals with just the characters' names switched around. So there's only one line in this chapter that was actually taken from the musical, and not even from any of the songs, oops. Just kinda trying to take inspiration from the musical without copying anything exactly.
> 
> In other words, you don't have to be familiar with Be More Chill to read this, and even if you are, I hope you don't recognize too much. :)

Opera was the background music of Wirt's life.

He wasn't sure when the transition had happened. Sometime after he'd come back from the Unknown, of course, so it had to be after Halloween. But it had come on so gradually. Wirt hadn't seen the changes until it was too late.

Things had changed when he and Greg came back out of that pond. That was hardly any surprise. An experience like that-more specifically, waking to find Edelwood branches wrapped around you, growing from your own soul-it wasn't easy to shake. When he woke up with nightmares, Wirt blew it off. It was when he didn't wake up, when the alarm clock blared in his ears as Wirt tried his hardest to sink into the ground and pretend he was a tree without any responsibilities or stresses or real life problems, that he should have worried.

But any red flags that he could point out now were all hindsight.

The real turning point had come sometime in January or thereabouts, when a particularly bad couple of weeks had sent Wirt spiraling into a funk he couldn't seem to drag himself out of. He was holed up in his room, ignoring Greg like usual (or, at least, "usual" for when he was feeling this way). He was staring at his ceiling, thinking about his latest classroom embarrassment and being shown up by Jason Funderberker (the human) and just how little he mattered to the people around him. He felt lost, and he felt hopeless, and he started playing with the possibilities. What if he'd never left the Unknown? What if no one had to deal with him anymore? What if he wasn't around to be such a terrible son, brother, and friend?

And it wasn't just a passing thought in his mind when the words came to him. It was a nearly tangible, desperate desire he'd spent time on, eventually concluding: _I wish I didn't exist._

That's when he heard it for the first time. A low hum and some words he couldn't quite make out, and the clearly stated words rumbling through his skull: " _Pardon me. This may hurt._ "

It was the Beast's voice. Wirt didn't have to even wonder about that. It's not like he had time to ponder it anyway as pain started shooting through his limbs.

Wirt could feel the branches sprouting, winding their way through his guts and digging themselves into his brain, in a way he hadn't when he was _actually_ becoming part of the forest. He screamed, loud enough for frantic parental steps to pound up the stairs and for Greg to start calling for him worriedly. His door was locked as usual, so they didn't burst in. He had enough time to try to readjust, try to get over the pain long enough to say "I'm fine" in a ragged voice before he heard " _It may get worse,_ " and a fresh pulse of pain shot through his body.

"I'm fine, I'm fine, it's okay, just… it's fine," he kept saying to his closed bedroom door until he thought he would be alone again. The pain was dulling and Wirt slumped against the door, blocking it with his body and for some reason desperate not for anyone else to come in.

Especially not Greg.

Wirt had clutched his skull at some point but slowly let go of it when he heard an amused chuckle.

Deep in the shadows of his room, there was that silhouette. That awful silhouette, branches sprouting and cloaked in leaves, which Wirt could almost make out if he squinted.

"You're here," he said disbelievingly to the shadow.

" _Where else would I be?"_ The Beast was amused. " _You summoned me._ "

"I didn't-" Wirt's voice was a squeak, and he cleared his throat. Bad memories. "I definitely didn't summon you. I'd remember!"

" _Call it what you will. I am here either way_." The Beast's massive antlers swept from side to side as the creature examined his surroundings. " _Is this your home? It's in a pathetic state._ "

"I was gonna clea… That's not important!" Wirt scowled at the Beast in a show of false bravado. "Get out of here! I don't want you in this house and I definitely don't want you anywhere near Greg. You can't have him!"

" _I'm not here for him, Wirt_." The Beast spoke lazily, not a care in the world. " _I'm here for you._ "

"You can't have me either!"

" _Mm_." It was the only acknowledgement Wirt got. " _You have no lantern here to blow out, so you may as well get accustomed to my company."_

"Wha…" Wirt was speechless for a second, his eyes darting to his bedroom door and back. "You can't just… I mean, people would _see_ you."

The Beast hummed to himself, the hauntingly familiar refrain of Come Wayward Souls, before he said, " _I exist only in your mind_. _All they would see is you, having an animated conversation with yourself. Though becoming the local madman would hardly cause a difference in your reputation._ "

"People don't think I'm crazy," Wirt muttered. He was stretching his fingers out uselessly, scanning his room for some kind of tool, a magic item to banish the Beast from his room (or his brain) forever.

" _Even Sara, after what you said today?"_

Wirt opened his mouth to retort but stopped. "How do you _know_ about that?"

The shadow's hand flipped dismissively. " _As I said, I'm in your mind. I know everything you do. And I'm here to help you._ "

"Yeah, right." Wirt thunked his head back against the door, already tired of this newest calamity in the mess he called his life. "If I didn't buy that line the first time, I'm not going to buy it now."

" _We shall see_." The Beast's voice rumbled through the room. Whether the noise was in his head or not, Wirt thought it a wonder that no one else heard. " _I'm here to change your life, Wirt. To change_ _ **you**_ _. At this point, no change can be a bad one._ "

Wirt thought back to what Jason Funderberker (the human) had said the previous day. How Wirt had realized so suddenly that he could never have so much self confidence, never be anything but a waste of space, never be able to take the necessary step back from his own frantic worrying to focus on someone else for a change. He let the self-loathing fill him as he closed his eyes. Whatever other lies the Beast might spin, this wasn't one of them. "Yeah," he eventually said.

" _You're disgusting_ ," the Beast agreed. " _A coward, feeble and useless, desperate for any sign of attention or affection from everyone near to you and so clingy that you push them away. Unable to effect any change to people's lives except for getting in their way. The ugliest specimen of humanity I have ever beheld."_

Wirt's eyes popped open at the blatant insults. He forced himself to stand. "Hey, no, I mean, if I'm that bad, and I beat you, you've got to be even wor-"

But the Beast was still talking. " _But it doesn't have to be like that. I can guide you._ _ **Teach**_ _you. We'll fix you piece by piece until you're something truly_ _ **worthwhile**_ _."_

It wasn't even the Beast's awful words that were shaking Wirt. It was how _good_ they sounded. "No. No, no, no, no, no. Get out of my room and _get out of my head_!" Wirt shrieked the last several words.

The Beast tsked. " _You see? What an utter lack of self-control. The others will hear you. Would you really like to explain this situation to little Gregory?_ "

Wirt's mouth was dry. Eventually he said, "No. He… he thinks he beat you. He still doesn't remember, I mean, I don't think he remembers…"

The Beast glided up to Wirt smoothly. Wirt tried to jump out of his skin when rough wooden fingers curled around his shoulder. " _Then this will be our secret_ ," the Beast said. Verbally or not, Wirt was forced to agree.

That was the first and most jarring meeting the two had had. True to his word, the Beast had stuck by Wirt's side day and night, his songs and humming ever-present. It was hellish, and not only because of a distaste of opera. Wirt found out quickly that the pain he'd felt was no anomaly. Whenever the Beast decided Wirt was doing something particularly bad-which could mean anything from stammering to turning down a social engagement to composing poetry to falling asleep in class-Wirt would feel the sharp pain of the Edelwood branches tighten in his gut.

And Wirt would ask the Beast constantly (though he'd discovered he could just think a message and the Beast would hear it-no need to talk to himself in class) what his end goal was, what the point of the torment could be. Each time, the Beast would only answer, " _I am trying to help you_ " in the same exasperated tone as a longsuffering teacher.

The issue was, after long enough with the Beast as a constant chiding, torturing, and occasionally even comforting presence, Wirt was starting to believe it.


End file.
